Court orders Japan to pay World War II slave labourers

Tokyo: In a landmark ruling, a court has ordered the Japanese Government and a transport firm to pay 88 million yen ($1.1 million) compensation to a group of Chinese who were forced to work as slave labourers in Japan during World War II.

Ten Chinese former labourers and two relatives of a deceased worker had originally demanded 275 million yen in redress.

The ruling by the Niigata District Court in northern Japan was greeted by a roar of applause from the plaintiffs and their supporters, Kyodo news agency said.

But a spokesman for the transport firm Rinko Corp said: "We do not think the ruling . . . is appropriate. We will consider whether to appeal after studying the details with our lawyers."

Dozens of wartime compensation suits have been filed against the Government and companies related to Japan's aggression in the first half of the 20th century. Most have been rejected by Japanese courts, and the ruling is the first to order the state to pay compensation.

According to the suit, the plaintiffs in the case were brought forcibly to Japan from China in 1944 and made to work in the coal transport business in Niigata. They were subjected to abuse and received no wages.

Tens of thousands of Koreans and Chinese were brought to Japan before and during World War II to work in its factories and mines as forced labourers for little or no pay to help keep the country's war machine going.

The Japanese Government's stance on war reparations is that they were settled once and for all in the 1951 San Francisco Peace Treaty that formally ended the Pacific War and in subsequent bilateral treaties.

With regard to China, the Government says all wartime compensation issues were settled by a 1972 joint statement that established diplomatic ties.

The landmark ruling comes as Tokyo and Beijing are engaged in a diplomatic feud over the ownership of a cluster of tiny islands in the East China Sea.